I share the amazing true story of how a young woman could go from being locked up in an Asylum to marrying a millionaire and holding the world record for traversing the globe!
Of all the remarkable Historical persons, I feel Nellie Bly may be one of the mostly shockingly forgotten. Growing up in a time where women were decades away from gaining the right to vote, Bly had a more impactful and exciting life than the vast majority of men of her time.
Elizabeth Jane Cochran was born into a financially comfortable household as the daughter of a small town judge and landowner. Unfortunately after his early death without a will, Elizabeth and her family were left without support and her life was thrown into chaos.
While helping her mother to run a boarding house, Elizabeth became frustrated by an article in the Pittsburgh Dispatch newspaper. the article argued that women were vastly inferior to men in a variety of ways. Under the pen name of 'Lonely Orphan Girl' Elizabeth would write a scathing rebuttal to the editor. This response was of such a high quality that it landed the young Elizabeth a full time job at the newspaper, although 'Lonely Orphan girl' would be replaced by the more catchy, 'Nellie Bly'.
As a quick aside, this would be just one of the many name changes which followed Elizabeth's through life. As a child she didn't want to be called Elizabeth, instead opting to be called 'Pinky' she would later decide this was a silly name and instead go back to Elizabeth Jane Cochran, although she would add an E to make herself a Cochrane instead. She would in time also add her husband's surname in also, become Elizabeth Cochrane Seaman.
Nellie Bly's career at the Dispatch would see her fighting for workers rights in factories and going up against the President of Mexico. However, before long Bly would move to New York to seek out new opportunities and would end up becoming front page news herself!
Working for Joseph Pulitzer at the New York World, Bly would volunteer to go undercover in the Blackwell's Island Asylum. Having got herself committed, Bly wrote a shocking expose of horrible conditions in the facility. The influence of Bly's undercover work as a journalist would lead to a variety of other papers hiring their own Nellie Blys to do further Undercover, or as it was then know, 'Stunt' journalism.
Bly would follow up the Blackwell's 'Stunt' with world spanning story. Having read Jules Verne's 'Around the World in 80 Days', Bly decided to attempt the racing feat herself. Travelling alone, she would make the remarkable trip in only 72 days, setting a world record holding pace in the process.
To try and summarize Nellie Bly's remarkable life fully in such a short space of words would be impossible but she would also go on to campaign for the rights of a woman to vote, marry a millionaire, become one of the first female industrialists, be accused of being a spy and yet more still!
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CREDITS
[Nellie Bly]
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington
Photographed By H.J. Myers
www.loc.gov/resource/cph.3b22...
Reproduction Number [LC-USZ62-75620]
[Nellie Bly Sets Out]
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington
Photographed By H.J. Myers
www.loc.gov/resource/cph.3b07...
Reproduction Number [LC-USZ62-59924]
[Milk Can Patent]
From a Google Patents Scan
Application filed by Elizabeth Cochrane Seaman
patents.google.com/patent/US6...
Application US4530301A
[Blackwell’s Island Asylum]
The British Library
Page 468 ‘King's Handbook of New York City.
An outline history and description of the American metropolis’.
www.flickr.com/photos/british...
Library Reference Numbers 001968597 (Physical) and 014872103 (Digital)
[Robert Seaman]
From The New York Public Library
Compiled by Moses King
digitalcollections.nypl.org/i...
Image ID [1690306]
[Edgar Allan Poe]
www.getty.edu/art/collection/...
allan-poe-american-late-may-early-june-1849/
Object Number [84.XT.957]
Digital image courtesy of the Getty's Open Content Program.
This video was not made in any collaborative way with any of the image holders.
MUSIC
Pure Potentiality - Benjamin Martins
Ammil - The Tides
Music from the RU-vid Audio Library
And With Special Thanks to KneecapsAnna!
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21 ноя 2020
